About Earthsong

Principles

This information booklet introduces the principles, design and processes of our ecohousing neighbourhood.

Over the past few decades many changes have taken place in our society. One of the results is that a growing number of people now find that the available housing fails to meet their needs. Household sizes have dropped, housing costs are escalating, and a multitude of people-single, elderly, single parent and blended families-are trying to live in housing created for the traditional 1950's family. Families and couples, too, are finding themselves isolated, having to make appointments to visit friends, and taxi children about in heavy traffic. In addition the nature of work is changing, as is our concern for the environment.

We are a group of people currently living in regular nuclear households, but with a vision of how a different way of living could be more sustaining of us individually, collectively and globally. Our vision includes building a cohousing community, which we are designing in conjunction with Bill Algie our architect, with our basic needs in mind, while also caring for the earth that sustains us.

We aim to recreate many of the advantages of the traditional village -advantages such as social contact, contact with nature, child care, economic efficiency and celebration. However, we seek to combine these with the sense of individual freedom and independence that is important to us in these times.

In addition to modelling 'social sustainability' the neighbourhood is being designed to the highest practical standards of environmentally sustainable human settlement, including the layout and design of neighbourhood and buildings, choice of materials, landscaping, and services. We hope it will also become home base for many green businesses.

We have purchased 4 acres (1.67Ha) at 457 Swanson Road in Ranui within Waitakere City and are planning 32 households-houses that will be freehold and of a range of sizes. We have chosen an urban location, partly because as a society we need to live more sustainably in cities, but mostly just because that's where we work, study and play. The eco-city vision of Waitakere City is particularly congruent with our vision, and provides fertile ground for this project.

It is a challenging project by any definition, but we see this project and others like it as essential to the long-term health and sustainability of both ourselves and our planet.

Vision Statement

Our vision is to establish a cohousing neighbourhood based on the principles of permaculture, that will serve as a model of a socially and environmentally sustainable community.

Within this vision, our aims are :

• To design and construct a cohesive neighbourhood whose layout, buildings, and services demonstrate the highest practical standards of sustainable human settlement
• To develop and foster a living environment which uses clear communication, decision-making and conflict resolution guide-lines that promote tolerance, safety, respect and co-operation
• To assist in education and public awareness of sustainability by demonstrating and promoting innovative community design and environmentally responsible construction.

Sustainable Settlements

While cohousing is largely a social innovation, Waitakere Eco-Neighbourhood both draws on and expects to contribute to the greater debate and journey towards sustainable human settlements. The project particularly has its roots in the now world-wide Permaculture and Eco-village movements, and also aligns with Agenda 21.

Eco-villages, whether rural or urban, attempt to bring together the many tools for sustainable living that are now largely available to us. The challenge is to integrate, as a whole, the areas of built environment, livelihood, ecology, personal & group process and decision-making. We see that Eco-villages in the urban environment are a natural building block toward Eco-cities.

The main principles of Permaculture are to care for the earth and to care for people. By creating complex assemblies of plants and animals in close proximity to people’s homes, Permaculture seeks to meet human needs in a more resource-conserving manner. Emphasis is placed on meeting food, water and energy needs locally—a concept particularly relevant to cities.

Agenda 21 is the action plan for ‘sustainable development’ that arose from the Rio Earth Summit in 1992. It was a commitment by world leaders to programmes to achieve a sustainable 21st century and beyond. It is significant that Waitakere City is one of only a few NZ councils to have embraced a local Agenda 21 policy. Agenda 21 recognised that the consumption patterns of cities are severely stressing global ecosystems, and proposed that sustainability must be tackled on three fronts: environmental, social and economic.

Environmental features

The eco-neighbourhood will be a high quality, visually attractive physical environment incorporating advanced sustainable architecture and technology and comprehensive sustainable landscape design. This includes:

• Overall design concept of buildings and neighbourhood to ensure architectural coherence and integration with the site
• All buildings oriented and designed for energy efficiency and natural climate control using passive solar design
• Building materials and components chosen with regard to energy content, toxicity, environmental impact, durability and recyclability
• Recycling centres near entrance for metals, glass, plastics and paper
• Rainwater collection for household and garden use, and on- site stormwater and wastewater treatment where possible
• Solar water heaters to provide the bulk of hot water needs
• The incorporation of other renewable energy technology where appropriate
• Clustering of buildings to allow sufficient common land for productive and edible landscaping and recreational spaces.
• Comprehensive site design based on permaculture principles to include productive landscaping and organic gardening principles

In line with our vision we will be in a unique position to trial, monitor and demonstrate many sustainable technologies and methods.

Social features

Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood seeks to provide a viable new housing option. Here we plan to meet the needs of the young, middle and older age groups, so as to create a diverse intergenerational 'village'. We seek to balance the needs of the individual and the community, in a way that allows both to flourish. Our concept includes more specifically:

• Physical design of the neighbourhood to encourage a strong sense of community, with many informal gathering places and layers between private and common areas
• Cars generally confined to the edge of the site, so as to create a 'people friendly' zone
• Clusters of dwellings arranged along common pathways and courtyards
• A common house will provide an important neutral ground and community space. It is envisaged as an extension of residents’ homes and therefore used on a daily basis.
• A mix of dwelling sizes to encourage a wide range of ages and household types.
• Dwelling kitchens to face the common space for supervision of children and neighbourhood security generally.
• Dwellings to each have a small but private and sunny outdoor space
• Provision of recreational facilities to meet the specific needs of children and teenagers
• Design considerations for the disabled and elderly, including several ground floor unit
• Unit Title ownership structure to enable individual ownership of dwellings plus a share of the common facilities
• Ongoing resident management by way of Body Corporate or similar structure.

Our wish is not to create an exclusive enclave, but to foster a sharing and exchange with neighbours and others alike. In this way we can fully integrate with and contribute to the wider community.

Economic features

We sought a site for the neighbourhood within the urban area, so as to support participation in the urban workplace. In addition, Earthsong embodies some of the mixed-use character of 'Urban Villages'. Some work and wealth will therefore be created on site as well as accommodating residential and recreational uses.

Residents of Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood will retain individual financial autonomy—while at the same time enjoying considerable economies of both money and time through co-operation.

The project also seeks to accommodate people with a wide range of financial means, and in this way promoting a better sense of economic equity.

The concept will include:

• A shared office support facility, and workshop(s)
• The possible provision of multipurpose workspaces for lease to either residents or neighbours
• Sufficient open space for growing food and the management of water and wastewater
• Economies generated by the shared ownership of some items such as hot tub, guestrooms, lawn-mower etc
• Economies generated by the structured co-operation of tasks, such as cooking of some common meals, as well as informal arrangements such as childcare and car pooling
• Reduced house running costs resulting from energy efficient design, and a likely reduction in travel costs
• The inclusion of one, two, three and possibly four room units to provide a range of living options/ affordabilities.
• We are exploring how rental units could be made available as part of the project.
• The provision of multipurpose workspaces for lease to either residents or neighbours is planned for stage II.